Cohort 2018 Central Region

About UpAccelerate 2018 Cohort

We believe that young people in Uganda have the potential to address social health challenges in their communities through entrepreneurship.

We shall continue to be a dependable partner in supporting young innovators by providing them with the practical skills & resources needed to enable them build socially impactful enterprises in health.

Up Accelerate was born as a regional initiative of United National Population Fund (UNFPA) East and Southern Africa, implemented by Outbox and funded by UKAID to explore new and engaging ways of tackling pressing sexual reproductive health challenges through promoting social entrepreneurship among young people.

Current Challenges

How might we improve demand and access to essential maternal health medicines & supplies in Uganda?

What the challenge is about: The Healthcare Problem

A number of efforts are ongoing to improve access to pharmaceuticals and supplies in the area of maternal health in Uganda. Ongoing efforts range from changes in procurement procedures between public health facilities and National Medical Stores, to initiatives undertaken to improve access to “tracer medicines” within public and private health institutions. The latter in particular has resulted in 64% of health units in Uganda having no stock outs for the 2014/2015 financial year. This has been mainly attributed to the growth in village health team-led (VHT) interventions as alternative distribution channels in rural areas, increase in health sector staffing, and deliberate focus on increasing access to tracer medicines.

However, significant challenges still exist for the distribution of Essential Medicines and Health Supplies (EMHS) in maternal health that include among others human resource constraints (adequacy, distribution disparities and skill gaps); communication breakdown between communities, health facilities, district health offices and the central level which leads to poor planning and forecasting; communities not utilizing the reproductive health services put in place; lack or limited access to supplies and consumables; and abuse of the referral systems.

As such, we are calling on youth to develop solutions that can improve access to maternal health pharmaceuticals and supplies in Uganda.

Potential Solution Areas

  • Healthcare financing to the mass market
  • Affordable and contextually relevant diagnostic tools or health supplies
  • Focus on patient engagement, experience and feedback mechanisms
  • Accountability systems within health
  • Absorption of the trained health care workforce into the public or private sector

How might we improve the use of data in healthcare planning, monitoring and delivery?

What the challenge is about :The Healthcare Problem

Great efforts have been made by stakeholders in the area of sexual and reproductive health to improve healthcare planning and delivery using electronic medical record systems and data aggregation platforms. Digital data collection tools that include SMS, smartphone apps are also being utilized by various organizations.

However, given the advent of these tools, more opportunities still exist to further improve healthcare delivery using open data. Open data is any kind of data made available by a business, organization or individual that is freely available for the public to use, analyze and republish.

Open data can include among others a list of medical service providers, a list of approved pharmacists, the distribution of finances to health facilities, a list of public health facilities, or a list of fresh water points.

Open data can be leveraged to track health service delivery, or improve access to healthcare. It also presents an opportunity to track and measure progress towards the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). We are looking for simple tools that leverage open data to improve healthcare delivery in Uganda.

Potential Solution Areas

  • Linking various health care systems to drive information exchange
  • Improving quality of patient care by leveraging data
  • Tools to improve decision making by complementing existing systems in health care;
  • Tools that leverage data to improve clinical and patient decision making
  • Predictive analysis of data to drive accurate forecasting during planning, reduce fraud, and improve performance monitoring

 

Featured Startups

Central Region
Central Region
Central Region
Central Region
Central Region
Central Region

Mentors & Judges

Mabel Ndawula
Mentor
Mabel Ndawula
Joshua Okello
Mentor
Joshua Okello
rukh-shana namuyimba
Mentor
Rukh-shana Namuyimba
Dr. Okello Samuel Moses
Mentor
Dr. Okello Samuel Moses
Timothy Musoke
Mentor
Timothy Musoke
Dr. Fredrick E. Kitoogo
Mentor
Dr. Fredrick E. Kitoogo
Richard Zulu
Mentor
Richard Zulu
Mentor
Raj Gangadia
Richard Ngamita
Mentor
Richard Ngamita
Mentor
John Kimani